Jyger’s Journeys Through Dungeons & Dragons – The Dark Pyramid of Sorcerer’s Isle (WARNING – SPOILERS FOR ADVENTURERS LEAGUE)

So, for a long time, I talked about wanting to get into Dungeons & Dragons. Well, late last year, I finally managed to do just that. My local comic shop, Heroes’ Beacon, had a guy coming in to set up D&D games for beginners (5th Edition, btw), so I joined up and have been playing ever since. And I wanna take a minute to thank Noah Antwiler, AKA The Spoony One, for inspiring me to get into D&D with his show, Counter Monkey. And I know, he hears that a lot, and wonders why that is, when a lot of his stories are of disastrously bad games or events in games… … …Well, after playing D&D for the better part of a year, I can tell you, that happens a lot. XD

Speaking of Counter Monkey, though, I’ve been contemplating the idea of blogging about some of these insanely bizarre, stupid, and even occasionally badass moments that I’ve been present for, and after asking the gang if they’d be okay with that, it was just a matter of deciding which one to go with…Luckily, I didn’t have to wait long, because my God, one of the weirdest freaking things I’ve ever been present to in a game happened over the course of the past few nights that we’ve played. It’s called the Dark Pyramid of Sorcerer’s Isle, and if you haven’t played that adventure and don’t want to be spoiled, stop reading RIGHT NOW.

…Okay, so our party had to travel from the town of Phlan to a place called Sorcerer’s Isle, where there was a pyramid. Apparently, there were these mutations happening to anything near the island, and the range away from the island that it was happening within was getting larger. So, we had to take a boat… … …Now, as someone who watches Counter Monkey, one lesson I’ve learned when it comes to D&D is to never get on the boat. Sure enough, we’re on that boat, and while we managed to make it pretty far, within visual range of our destination (by which time, we’d seen some weird shit, like trees that essentially seemed to be growing upside down), we were attacked by giant squids. I just pointed to each and every person at the table and yelled “I told you, I told you, I told you, and I ESPECIALLY told you!” Oh, and not just giant squids, but giant squids that, when they died, exploded into swarms of piranha. Luckily, we have a druid in our party that could likewise turn into a giant squid and helped to even the odds a bit. In fact, he got one of the enemy squids restrained to the point where our tiefling paladin, who is usually the silver-tongued goofball of the team, ran a spear straight through all of its tentacles at once, which left it SUPER easy prey. Suffice to say, though, the boat was pretty badly damaged, and the captain almost died. Fortunate for him, my character’s bonds says that he will not leave others to die, so I saved his ass from falling in the water where the swarms of man-eating piranha were waiting for him.

So, we leave the boat and get to land, and right from the get-go, as soon as we’re in the pyramid, bodies everywhere just past the entrance. If I’d known what was waiting for us in that pyramid, I wouldn’t have been nearly as scared to get on the boat. In fact, if anything, I would’ve wanted to stay with the boat while everyone else went in. Ghosts, re-arranging passageways leading us in circles, dead bodies, spider webs, lizard men, giant frog monsters, clouds of poisonous gas, it was one death trap after the next in that Goddamn pyramid. I won’t go over the whole thing (technically, I can’t, because I had to miss one night we were there), but suffice to say, it was weird…though nothing could prepare me for what was waiting at the end.

After taking down a small pack of giant mutant frog monsters, we made it to a chamber where there was, as near as our wizard could figure, a tear in the fabric of reality leading to a realm of pure chaos. And flowing from said tear? Rainbow-coloured chemicals of chaos that mutated anyone and anything they came in contact with in a randomized way. Apparently, that was also the cause of everything weird going on in the pyramid. So, okay, we found the chamber that was the source of the problem, so we could shut it down, right? Well…see, like I said, our paladin is a bit of a goof off. And, unfortunately, he was not the only person who decided to experiment with these chemicals. So, whereas a sane party would go ahead and dispel magic on the runes keeping the rip open, ours decided to experiment with the chemicals a bit. Now, I personally called it quits with experimenting with it when I dipped my short sword into it and got back a sword made of bubble gum. Unfortunately, our sorcerer, who is insane, decided to literally jump, tuck, and roll straight through the stuff, inadvertently drinking some of it on his way. Within a few seconds, his toes sprouted new eyes, and within a few minutes, he was a giant mass of nothing but eyes, meaning he was technically brain dead for a few minutes, as he HAD NO BRAIN. Other mutations included a lizard woman having a wing, our monk having her legs transformed into one made of crystal and one coated in feathers, our paladin having his arm turned to steam, his other hand being turned into an egg, and his tail straight up disappearing, our druid being turned into some kind of blue horned monstrosity, and our orc barbarian having his legs replaced with THE SUN, which somehow didn’t melt us. I am convinced that somewhere, on some plane of existence, H. P. Lovecraft was looking down on us and the bizarre mutants we were becoming and going “What the fuck?!” I never wanna go anywhere near anything that is remotely associated with the realm of chaos ever again after that bullshit.

Anyway, that’s all for the first story I wanted to share with everyone. Lemme know if you’d like to hear more, or if you’ve got a funny story of your own in D&D. Ja né!

My Thoughts On RAW Last Night And The Current Main Event Picture In WWE

Y’know, I haven’t really talked much about wrestling on here in a LONG time, but there’s something I gotta get off my chest about last night’s show, and the WWE main event picture. If you didn’t see last night’s RAW, here’s what happened: It was revealed that Seth Rollins passed along the idea to Triple H to make John Cena vs. Randy Orton (or as Spoony likes to call it, “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!”) at Hell In A Cell a #1 Contender Match. In other words, the winner takes on Brock Lesnar, presumably at Survivor Series, for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Of course, the reason is obvious: Rollins wants Lesnar and his opponent to beat the hell outta each other and so he can cash in his Money In The Bank contract and win the belt the easy way.

Regardless, at the end of the night, we had John Cena and Dean Ambrose vs. Randy Orton, Kane, and Seth Rollins in a Handicap Tag Team Street Fight. I don’t know why there’s tagging in a Street Fight, but whatever. The point is, about two thirds of the way into the match, Kane ordered the Hell In A Cell, which had been hung in the air all night, to be lowered, effectively making it a Handicap Tag Team Hell In A Cell Match. The end result is that these five guys beat the piss outta each other with chairs, tables, and Singapore Canes, and the match ended with Orton hitting the RKO on Ambrose for the win, only to get Curb Stomped by Rollins before he had a chance to celebrate. Hell, he got hit before the announcer could even say his name. And so, the show ended with Rollins on top of the Hell In A Cell celebrating atop the bodies laying in the ring.

So, a couple of thoughts. First off, I’m kinda confused as to why we’re getting two Hell In A Cell matches at the show on Sunday, when we coulda just thrown Brock Lesnar in with these five guys and make it a 6-Man Hell In A Cell Match for the title. Heck, one of those matches scheduled for Sunday is one we’ve already seen before, and is a match including two men that have literally wrestled each other at LEAST a hundred times on live TV (not sure about non-televised shows, so the number could actually be several times that amount). Now, my guess is that Brock’s agreed-upon schedule keeps him from being used every show. And I KNEW that was gonna happen. In fact, it was my one concern with putting the belt on him. Now, I understand that Brock is still not used to a regular schedule, and I of course can accept him not showing up every week on RAW…But when you are the WWE Heavyweight Champion of the World, when you are the face of said company, you have a certain responsibility to represent it at every Pay-Per-View! This is why Daniel Bryan was stripped of the belt: He couldn’t uphold said responsibilities and obligations due to injury, so he had to forfeit the title. And by the way, if this match DOES in fact take place at Survivor Series? Guess how long that is since his last title defense at Night of Champions? Almost exactly two months! So I don’t wanna hear the ’30 day mandatory title defense clause’ EVER brought up again!

…*sighs* Okay, better now. Anyway, the other thought that occurs to me after checking out the aforementioned Spoony One’s Twitter today is…why is John Cena being rewarded with the possibility of becoming #1 Contender, when he lost the Contract On A Pole Match against Ambrose to determine which of them fought Seth Rollins at Hell In A Cell? Why isn’t Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins to determine the #1 Contender? Now, I already gave the in-story explanation, which fits the character Seth Rollins is portraying currently: He’s the clever coward, always looking to take the easy way out of situations. However, the problem is that the audience now needs to sit through Cena vs. Orton Part God-Knows-What to determine who takes on Brock, and that match will either be Brock vs. Cena for the third time this year, or a Hell vs. Heel match for the championship. And unless the plan is to turn Randy Orton face, which has been historically proven to be a bad idea at least twice that I know of, and have him win the belt, only for Rollins to come in and steal it from him, it’s probably gonna be Cena beating Brock to win the title for the 16th time (which means he ties Ric Flair, which should just not happen, but you know they’ll do it), only to have the belt taken from him by Rollins.

Anyway, where does this leave us for the main event picture? Well, we know that Seth Rollins will eventually gain the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. That’s a given. The question is, where do we go from there? The theory is that Daniel Bryan, body willing, will get his shot to get the belt back at Wrestlemania. And really, Rollins vs. Bryan? AWESOME main event. Otherwise, the other major contenders are Dean Ambrose, John Cena, and Roman Reigns. And my guess is that Brock Lesnar will probably fight one of the men not chosen to fight Seth Rollins, which is another reason why I hope Daniel Bryan is the man to take on the champ, because he’s NOT beating Brock. I’m sorry, I like Daniel Bryan a lot, but look at what both he and Brock bring to the ring. They both have a very similar style, except Brock is a LOT bigger, and Daniel Bryan is maybe a LITTLE faster. Also, I would NOT want to put a guy fresh off a career-threatening-injury against Brock Lesnar first thing, ‘cuz Lesnar might just fucking kill him. O_O

So yeah, those are my thoughts on RAW last night, and the current title picture for the foreseeable future. Leave a comment below what you think about this, as well as your own conclusions, and we’ll see what becomes of the title picture by Survivor Series.

Speculations on The Spoony Experiment

I’ve been doing a lot of speculation regarding the current storyline taking place on The Spoony Experiment, although as of recent eps, I think it might be safe to refer to it as The Sephiroth Experiment, but I’ll get to that. But yeah, these are a few speculations on plot points that have occurred and how it’s all tying together, and possibly where it’s all leading. Also, this will obviously have spoilers for people who haven’t been watching for a while, to which I only grant a single chance to turn back.

Read a book people, I’m the goddamn SPOILERS!!!

…Anyway, with that out of the way, let’s start off with a big one. Oh, and please remember that I could be WAY off with any of these. It’s just speculation.

Burton is working for Sephiroth

This one should be obvious. At the end of part two of the Final Fantasy X-2 review, Sephiroth appears by Burton, and we see in the Skullduggery review that he’s gone missing. He mysteriously returns at the beginning of part three of the FFX-2 review, but it’s clear that his programming has been altered. Also, we see that upon seeing Spoony, something called the Geostigma Protocol has been engaged. I’m not entirely sure if this means that Spoony has Geostigma or that it’s simply a codename to link it to Sephiroth, but either way it’s proof that Burton has been reprogrammed to work for Sephiroth, and if that one doesn’t sell you on that theory, this one should.

What Spoony is seeing isn’t real

For anybody that saw the ending of the Game Over review, you know what I’m talking about. If not, I will explain: At the end of the review, Spoony comments on the lameness of the plot and how the villain sends the protagonist into a virtual world to remain until he goes crazy. As soon as he mentions this, he sees the ankh, the symbol of the Avatar, and we are treated to some Grade A nightmare fuel. In case it was moving to fast for you to catch the whole thing, allow me to slow it down for you.

This seems to suggest that Burton has placed Spoony in some type of virtual reality that is subjecting him to instances that are driving him further into his insanity and rage, and once he started to realise it, was shocked back into his virtual prison and set back on course. But what’s the purpose of doing this? Why subject him to all of this? Well, that leads into the next point…

Sephiroth is using Spoony to drop Meteor on the Planet

Okay, for those of you that don’t know Sephiroth’s backstory, I suggest that you go read up on it. A great summary can be found here:

http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Sephiroth#Story

If you don’t want to read about it, I will state the one thing about his story and his goal that most matters here: In Final Fantasy VII, Sephiroth planned to drop Meteor on The Planet, thus damaging it to such a degree that the Lifestream would have to emerge to heal the damage, at which point he would situate himself in the centre of the impact zone and merge with it completely, thus becoming a god. This seems to suggest that in the TGWTG universe (that Spoony’s show still takes place in, despite being fired), there is a Lifestream running through our world as well. However, rather than use Black Materia to call upon Meteor, Sephiroth seems to have utilized a different method: I believe he is actually using Spoony’s anger as a power source to drag Meteor towards the world. And because Spoony is currently residing in his virtual prison, he is completely unaware of what’s really going on…although it seems that someone has tried to warn him.

The Guardian and Sephiroth are NOT working together

Okay, I don’t want people to think that I’m suggesting the Guardian is a good guy hear. He very obviously desires to destroy and have people bow to his feet. However, I’m fairly certain that his goals conflict with Sephiroth’s. What makes me say that? Well, after rewatching the ending to the Ultima 9 review and the little Mass Effect 3 spoof that’s done there, the red and green endings seem to suggest that Spoony would cause the destruction of the world. As I pointed out before, Sephiroth’s character is not that of someone who just wants to destroy the world, and Noah Antwiler knows that better than anyone. Instead, I’m pretty sure that the Guardian is instead out to destroy and conquer and also to screw over Sephiroth’s plans.

So all of that put together, I’m pretty sure I can come to the following conclusions for what’s to come…

Spoony is going to review Final Fantasy XIII

This is what this current storyline is leading up to, no doubt. Noah has gone on record as saying that Final Fantasy XIII is, in his opinion, the worst Final Fantasy game ever (with possible exception being FFXIV, but let’s face it, EVERYONE hated that one lol). Plus, there’s the simple fact that Sephiroth gave him the case for the game, Burton was shown holding it at the end of the Game Over review, and it was inside the Armageddon spellbook when the Guardian gave it to Spoony. It clearly plays a role in Sephiroth’s plans, and as I alluded to before, they seem to be to bring Meteor down and merge with the Lifestream, thus becoming a god. Only by realising what’s been happening to him and breaking free can Spoony hope to stop him.

The three endings the Guardian shows won’t end up happening

Okay, I’m pretty sure the colour coded endings parodying Mass Effect 3 was just a joke, but even if it isn’t, I doubt very much any of them will be what actually ends up happening. I just feel that Noah is a bit smarter than to actually do that, or at least if he were to he would have some kinda follow up to it that doesn’t make it the end. Rather, his statement at the end of the Ultima 9 review and the look of determination in his eyes seem to suggest that he will find the fourth way out of this, stop Sephiroth, and save the world.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Again, I could be VERY wrong in a lot of my speculation here, but it is just speculation, so don’t rip me to shreds if things don’t play out like I said. Ja ne!

My 70th Post! Channel Awesome Time Force

Requested by my friend GracefulWitch. Footage and audio obviously belong to Saban, Channel Awesome, and Cinemassacre.

Oh, and Happy 70th Post to ME! LOL XD

Channel Awesome Year 4 Fan-Trailer – One Day More

Just a little something I spent a good part of the day working on: A fan-made trailer for the upcoming Year 4 event occurring later this year. I do not own the footage or music, they belong to Doug Walker, Lewis Lovhaug, Lindsay Ellis, and the rest of Channel Awesome. Please forgive the crappy quality, the best I’ve got for making videos is Windows Live Movie Maker. Oh, and the cameo I make at the end is not meant to be taken seriously, it was just a joke.